Moments
by BeardShifter
Summary: A collection of moments from all over the Solar system and attempts at lore. I'm not really good at summaries. I own no rights to Warframe.
1. Chapter 1

Karon took another blow from the Charger, which emptied his lungs from any air they still had, and ripped a piece of armor apart, wounding him. Karon tried to stay upright, but the blow had too much force, and he collapsed violently against a wall. The Charger roared and ran towards him, readying the final blow. Karon held his Grakata with one hand and pulled the trigger,emptying the magazine, and blowing one of the Charger's arms off. The creature screeched and collapsed near him. For some moments, both stared at each other, burning hate in the Grineer's eyes, and a strange peace on the Charger's many eyes. The Charger tried to get up, but collapsed again. Then it became still. The technocyte virus started consuming its body.

Karon's vision started blurring, and his grip on the Grakata weakened. He heard some noise to his left, where a hallway was. Voices. He turned his head to look at the hallway. A squad of Grineer, his brothers, appeared. He mustered what was left of his strength, and called for his brothers. The group suddenly stopped, and turned their heads to him. A Ballista approached him.

"Wounds?", she asked. Karon looked to his torso. He hadn't realized the Charger had pierced his armor, wounding him deeply. That meant his fate was sealed. Karon didn't answer.

The Ballista looked at him more closely, and saw the huge gash in Karon's torso. She held her Vulkar to his head. A loud bang. And Karon's world went black.


	2. Chapter 2

The crewman endlessly patrols the endless hallways of the ship. He and hundreds more, all slaves to the greed of Corpus. Brainwashed, empty husks, devoid of free will and feelings, existing only to serve the Company. Alongside them, walk machines. They resemble animals in shape, but those animals no longer exist. The Grineer exterminated every single one, on Earth. Part of their "genetic purity" philosophy, or something along those lines.

It could be argued that everyone aboard the ship is a machine. After all, the crewmen have no more feelings than a MOA. Apart from the occasional VIP or prisoner, the ship is essentially dead.

The crewman is still patrolling the hallways. He analyses every single corner of the route he was assigned, and notices a discrepancy. A tiny, easy to miss discrepancy. A vent has been displaced. The crewman becomes wary, and warns his comrades about the vent. His helmet distorts the words, but they can still understand him, as the distortion is decoded by the receptors in their boxy helmets. Immediately, the ship's inhabitants spring to life, crewmen running around, warning other crewmen, activating alarms and MOA builders, and securing any prisoners the ship is carrying.

The crewman is, like his comrades, running around, rifle at the ready, looking for a potential intruder. Suddenly, something grabs him from behind. The crewman doesn't even have time to utter an alert, and something sharp and cold is driven into his back, bypassing the shields and severing his spine. The Crewman is left dying, and catches a glimpse of his assailant as it runs by. A Tenno, in a strange warframe, which he recognizes as "Ash", from his indoctrination. The Tenno is already making short work of the other crewmen, and in the distance, MOAs can be heard running.

10 minutes later, the ship is completely silent. MOAs lay destroyed, and there are corpses of crewmen everywhere. The ship is dead. Then again, wasn't it always?


	3. Chapter 3

"Rise", she heard a voice say. But she returned to his sleep. She, of all people, knew it was well deserved. 20 years. 20 years fighting, seeing comrades get gruesomely killed, torn apart, blown to pieces, poisoned, drowned, burnt to crisps… The list goes on. But she had survived. She, with a simple blade and light armor, had made it where heavily armored behemoths who lived for nothing but to spread chaos and destruction, had perished. Had made it when everyone in her ship was butchered by screeching machines and hollow men. Had fought the Tenno scum, and won. And for what? Those people don't care. They just sent her and millions more to their deaths, part of some deranged crusade started by a madman centuries ago. A crusade for "purity". The crusade was doomed to fail since the beginning, as its founder wasn't even "pure" to begin with. He was but one in many in history. People who claw their way to power, and send all the others to their demise. Up until very recently, she had believed this crusade. It was the only thing she could hold on to, after all the death and cruelty she had witnessed. But now she was dead. It didn't matter anymore. Trillions could die, she didn't care. She just wanted rest.

"Rise", the voice repeated. It was starting to get annoying. Why didn't this thing let her rest? Its voice was loud and deep, and had something unsettling about it. But, she continued to rest. She wouldn't be denied this. Not anymore.

"RISE!"

This time, she bolted awake. She was lying in the metal floor of a Galleon. Strange creatures wandered around her. She looked at a window, and saw her reflection. Everything about her was now twisted and deformed. Then it hit her. "I died…fighting Infested!", she thought. She went through a myriad of emotions, but fear was the strongest one. "Am I…Am I Infested? No, this can't be! They told me the sanitization systems worked! Why is this happening?!"

A towering, gangly form approached her. It had a head full of tentacles, and its limbs were asymmetrical and unusual. On its back, it carried what looked like a shell, which made it look like it had an "aura" of sorts. She went still as the creature approached. When it finally got near her, it extended a tentacle, and touched her. It didn't speak with words, but instead conveyed feelings of tranquility and reassurance. She understood. These creatures, these Infested, were now her brothers.

"So now you understand", the voice boomed again. She got up, and started following the tall creature, wherever it would take her.


	4. Chapter 4

The MOA acquires another target, an infested runner. The scanners indicate the target is injured and an easy kill. The MOA screeches and readies the cannon mounted on its back. The Runner notices it, and charges. It doesn't get far, as the machine tears it apart with high intensity lasers. Another target down. It scans the surroundings and finds no signs of life, so it charges across the nearest hallway, looking for its next prey. It runs the entire length of the hallway, and as it turns the corner, sees a crewman being pounced on by a charger. The crewman hits the charger with his Prova, and leaves it temporarily paralyzed. The MOA finishes the job, firing at the charger until the virus removes it from existence. It analyses the crewman's health, and finds he is gravely injured. But the protocol must be respected, and so the MOA leaves the crewman bleeding out, and keeps charging across the ship's hallways, looking for its next target.


	5. Chapter 5

The lancers and butchers charged across the hallway, Gorgons firing behind them to provide cover. The Corpus responded with fire of their own, with elite crewmen popping out of cover to tear Grineer apart with their precise lasers, forcing the charging troops to take cover. The Corpus didn't suppress them for long, as there were multiple missiles flying towards their positions, so they took cover again. The lancers saw the missiles fly by, and knew the bombards would keep the scum busy for some seconds. They started running towards the enemy positions again, with the heavy units behind them. When they reached the Corpus positions, chaos ensued. The Grineer outnumbered the Corpus heavily, but that was balanced out by the crewmen's superior technology. Butchers chipped away at crewmen's shields, being quickly disposed of, but keeping the crewmen distracted enough for the more powerful lancers to finish them off. When the heavies arrived, it was over for the Corpus. Another position was taken, and the Company lost a bit more ground. The squad called in a transport ship, and were promptly carried to the next meat grinder. On the way, they were shot down by Corpus artillery. But the invasion goes on.


	6. Chapter 6

The crewman knows not who he fights for. The crewman knows not who he is. The crewman knows not who he fights. He only knows he must fight, he is driven by some invisible force, something deeply ingrained in the deepest, darkest pit in his mind that he must fight. And that he must fight constantly. Never surrender. Always keep pushing. And so the crewman does. The crewman charges at Grineer squads when he is the only one left alive in the ship. He attempts to hit the clones with his shock prod, and is peppered by bullets, so he goes down. But he gets back up, because the fight is not over. He limps at the Grineer, who empty their magazines on him again. But the crewman refuses to die, and drags himself up to a gunner, and weakly pokes her in a leg with the already broken, useless prod. The gunner considers him for a moment, and then aims her Gorgon at his head. The crewman doesn't fight anymore.


	7. Chapter 7

The Grineer are not usually a very welcoming race. They are taught to hate from birth, and so they hate. They hate the Corpus, they hate the Tenno, they hate the Lotus, they hate the Infested, they hate the Corrupted, they hate the Orokin, they hate plants, but above all, they hate the desert skates. Pesky creatures, who are constantly bothering colonists in the scorching deserts of Phobos. They give the Grineer no rest. A trooper can be peacefully taking his daily dose of delicious cancerigenous grey synthetic "food", and then, take a spike to the face from one of the blasted creatures. Then, not only does he have to go to the medical bay to get his daily tumor removal, courtesy of the grey slurry, he also has to get the huge spike removed from his head. All before the neurotoxin starts to work. It's quite the bother. But the creatures have other nefarious ways of pestering the poor soldiers. They have been known to sneak behind troopers patrolling cliffsides, moving underground, and suddenly pop out, pushing the troopers, which results in several broken bones and damaged armor. This is why High Command recently had the brilliant idea to restrict Cliffside patrol to Hellion units. But the skates are devious, and, upon pushing the Hellions from the cliffs, turn into AA guns and bombard them with spikes until their jetpacks run out of fuel, which leads to broken bones, damaged armor, and the destruction of the jetpacks, which are quite expensive. Just last month, High Command has spent over 4 million credits fighting the desert skate threat, which they identify as the foremost threat to the Empire's interests presently. The creatures seem to be everywhere, and through coordinated efforts manage to weaken the Empire's hold on Phobos. Brilliant minds in administration have recently suggested that the desert skates maintain close ties to the Tenno, weakening outposts which are then attacked by Tenno squads. The Tenno kill them, but the hypothesis of this only serving the purpose of misleading the Grineer is widely accepted. After all the skates are evil masterminds not to be trifled with. Lastly, troop morale in Phobos is constantly undermined by the skates, which regularly burst from the ground in front of the troops and present them with a nightmarish grin. The situation on Phobos is precarious for the Empire, ad with the recent Corpus offensives, they may have to abandon the settlements soon.


	8. Chapter 8

He could very well have been another empty Corpus machine, roaming around ships, looking for threats and responding when one appeared, not questioning or feeling anything, just doing his job. He could have been a Grineer, one in many, with nothing to differentiate him and his brothers and sisters except how intense his hatred and insanity were. He could have been an Infested host, part of the greater whole, vying to bring all life under the influence of the technocyte virus, by any means necessary. He could have been a Tenno, hunted by the merchant and the warlord, silently fighting for balance in a system plunged deeper into chaos every day by factions fighting over the meager scraps of an ancient war. He could have been a million things, but he wasn't. And he found himself thankful for it.

He was what unenlightened individuals such as all the above would refer to as the "Corrupted", a being enslaved by an Orokin tower, which would control him for eternity. But he was not a slave. He guarded the tower of his own accord. There was no enslaving. He had been shown the glory of the Empire's days, a golden age that seemed endless. And then the tower offered him to be a part of Its restoration, fighting to truly restore balance to the system, guarding the towers as they prepared to cleanse the system of all the war, disease and corruption. And then he accepted. Alongside him walked hollow men, no longer hollow as the tower healed them from their blind servitude, and showed them a brighter future. Alongside him walked Infested hosts, fragments of a collective mind, who was one day created by the dead empire in its direst hour. These fragments had managed to detach from the corrupt, obsessed hive mind that controlled most Infested, and joined the cause of Orokin. Alongside him walked machines, perfect constructs, of a technological mastery that none of the factions could hope to equal for thousands of years. They offered the same future to anyone who would enter the void, a worthy cause to restore a golden age. But the faceless creatures, they aren't fooled by the towers. They know what will happen if Orokin is restored. They know they are being watched by something outside the system, something waiting for Orokin to reappear, as it did countless times during the ages. All of those rebirths were short lived, put down swiftly by the invisible foe. But the towers fight on.


	9. Chapter 9

The Lotus exists to maintain balance. She is a highly advanced AI built solely for the purpose of maintaining balance in the Origin system. She has employed various methods of doing so throughout the centuries. Although not inherently evil, nor good, she will not hesitate do do anything that might be labelled as one of the previous two if it maintains balance. The Lotus has recently awakened the Tenno from cryosleep. Just one of the thousands of tools left to the Lotus by the Orokin to keep the status quo in the Origin system. The Tenno she recently activated are wreaking havoc all around the system, upsetting balance and assassinating important individuals. This is, of course, not favorable to the cause of balance, but the Lotus knows this, and keeps all the factions in check. She employs a being auto-proclaimed the "Stalker", another one of the tools left to her, to hunt down Tenno who have upset the balance greatly through, for example, the murder of several key individuals for different factions, leaving dangerous power vaccums in their wake. The Stalker attempts to kill such Tenno, returning time and time again if it doesn't succeed at first. It eventually manages to put down the designated Tenno, and restores balance. One may think this is absurd, but if the Tenno ruled, there would be no balance, would it?


	10. Chapter 10

Vor has seen countless battles over his lifetime. Ever since he was out of the cloning pod, Vor fought. He fought for survival at first, with the weak, rusty armor and cleaver of a regular butcher, sent to the frontlines without a second thought. Just the guy with the huge knife who is expected to charge at heavily armed foes and then try to make dents. If it was luck or cunning that made Vor survive, not even he knows. He was regularly stationed in infested areas. It was easy to cut through the wretches, the cleaver slashing through them like they were made of butter. Of course there were bigger threats, like those lumbering hunks of tumorous flesh and fossilized armor that took more than a few swipes to put down. Vor still chuckles a bit at those memories. Good times, he remembers. The thrill of close combat, dodging the swipes of the creatures as he carved them apart with his own swipes. The feeling of being in the frontline, screaming as he charged the creatures, which in turn charged at him with their own roars. A salute of sorts. His brothers behind him, backing him up as their peppered the creatures with bullets.

Vor survived past those times, his intelligence allowing him to see past the rage that seemed to overcome his comrades in battle. He took cover when the other butchers charged at the enemy, waiting for the lancers and gunners to pin the enemy down before jumping out and chopping every last one of the cowering enemies to pieces. He sometimes had to take part in the blind charge, as his comrades needed him to be a distraction. By luck, he almost always made it to the enemy without more than a few wounds. Eventually, Vor was granted a Grakata rifle, a rusting piece of scrap metal, additional armor, and a mask. Vor refused to wear the mask. He wanted his enemies to see his face, to look him in the eye before he pulled the trigger and their world went black. The lancer years eventually ended, however, and he was forced to put on the mask. Vor was now an elite lancer, finally with some proper armor and a weapon he could trust not to fall apart in the heat of battle, as had happened with his old Grakata many times, forcing him to mount it back up. Vor kept the thing, as a memory of those times. He still curses it every day. Of what he had survived through. Vor kept all the weapons issued to him over the years, except for his cleaver. That one was issued to another butcher, another piece of cannon fodder, and was lost in time.

Countless battles followed. Vor fought all across the solar system, for Empire and Queens. He made countless allies and countless enemies, rising through the ranks and keeping his rivals down, while propping those who had helped him up. He was betrayed many times, but managed to outsmart the traitors and get back at them through force or guile. These times would prove invaluable for him later in his life. He attributes his survival through the unforgiving world of Grineer politics to these times, who taught him the basics, so to speak.

Vor eventually attained the rank of captain in the military, when the former captain granted him the title after Vor dragged him to an escape pod during an infested raid on the galleon they were aboard. The captain stepped out of the military and went on to become a politician, a post he had been considering for some time, but couldn't accept due to the lack of someone worthy to replace him. That man's name was Vey Hek, a great soldier in his time. He survived to this day through heavy use of body modifications and augmentations, a path Vor would later follow as well.

After becoming captain, Vor stayed out of direct combat. He would lead his troops from high above, rarely fighting with them. When he fought alongside them, it was only so he could establish a fearsome reputation for himself. He became feared all across the system for this. However, he eventually settled down in Mercury. He liked to be alongside the recruits, for he saw himself in them. In the butchers he saw the old times, in the lancers and troopers, the countless battles he fought. Among these recruits was a lancer who would one day reach the rank of lieutenant. Lech Kril, the Hammer of the Empire. Vor is currently considering him for the next captain, although he has some competition from Kela de Thaym. Vor likes to see them compete. In truth, he isn't planning to step down too soon. He still likes ordering the recruits around.

And so, Vor continues to fight. He always did. He always will. His recently acquired Orokin technology makes him virtually unkillable. But times are changing fast. And there are some who think the old man deserves his rest. His final, eternal rest.


End file.
